Welcome Home
by The Crazy Chick In Black
Summary: She supposes that maybe - just maybe - she could see this place as home. Shinji/Hiyori, spoilers for Turn Back The Pendulum.


"Well, this is it." Shinji gives a grin that's more like a grimace. He gives a flamboyant gesture to the giant wreck of a warehouse, cold, gloomy and grey among its bright surroundings. "Our new home." She doesn't answer, merely grunts and kicks up gravel.

"Whoa, it's huuuuuge!" Mashiro cries out enthusiastically, running forward, eager to explore.

"Hey, don't be getting ahead of yourself, dumbass!" Kensei yells after her, reaching forward to grab her scarf and missing by several inches. Lisa merely follows the former captain as he chases his lieutenant around their new place of residence.

"Well, what do you know. Feels like home already." Love let out a low grunt as he hefts one of their many, many boxes onto his shoulder.

"It'll feel even more homey once all these boxes are unpacked," he says , catching a bag handle with his foot and swinging it over in front of Rose, who takes it.

"Well?" Hiyori looks up at Shinji, who almost looks expectant.

"Well what?" He gives her an annoyed look.

"Hey, I know it's not the best of places, but it's a roof over our heads, at least!" Hiyori nods absentmindedly, remembering the harsh days - was it really only twenty years back? - when they were camping out under bridges and living on bread crusts and salt water.

"Meh. Let's get inside already, dickhead. It's freezing out here."

* * *

  
"Anyway, we've got running water - Kisuke said this place was used to store fish, so the water was used to keep this place cooled down - and there's some electricity, too..." Hiyori zones Shinji out as he does his impression of a real estate agent, instead choosing to glare at an innocent fly.

"He's also putting in a basement downstairs later on, and he says he can get us a grill like they have at okonomiyaki restaurants!" It buzzes around the room in a carefree way, completely oblivious to the eight new people in its home. Hiyori keeps her eyes on it, and readies her hands for some bug-smashing.

"Of course, we're going to need to get jobs now - water and food cost money, and we can't keep on buying from Kisuke on credit. He's one hell of a business shark nowadays..." It lands on an empty folding chair, its tiny wings twitching as it scurries along the cold metal surface. Hiyori tries to keep her movements as slow and quiet as possible - not  
an easy feat for somebody like her - tiptoes right up behind it... raises her hands around it, ready to-

"Hiyori, are you even listening?" In that instant, the bug flies away, Hiyori's hands smack together painfully, and she finds herself leaning over way too far to be able to catch herself again.

"OUCH! Why'd you do that, dickhead?! I nearly had him!" Shinji glares at the small girl, who glowers up at him in return while rubbing the rapidly purpling bruise above her eye.

"Well, it's your fault in the first place. I was talking, you know." Hiyori just grunts as she lifts herself off the floor, rejecting Lisa's offered arm of assistance.

"Che. As if anyone could stay awake while you're talking, dickhead!" A swelling tick grew in the former captain's forehead.

"Say what, snaggletooth?"

If you were to later ask the other members of their little group of castaways, they would call the fight that followed "something out of the pages of a shonen manga", "a tumbling tumult - like something from Beethoven's Fifth", and "there was a fight?"

* * *

"So, how are we going to divide up the bedrooms?" Rose brought up a good point. The place Urahara had found for them was quiet, out of the way, and big, but it did have one major downside. That being the number of free rooms it had. Not including bathrooms and the big open area they had all decided was the living room, there were exactly three rooms. They weren't exactly small rooms, but they all had their own ideas about where they should be sleeping.

"I don't care who I'm bunking with, just as long as I get the loft room," Lisa says from her position, seated on top of the trunk that holds everything she owns in the world.

"You three girls can share the loft, then." Love suggests, looking around to see if anyone disagrees with his suggestion. Judging from the huge – and vaguely creepy – grin on Kensei's face, he doesn't mind the arrangement one bit.

"Woo-hoo! We get the loft!" Mashiro cheers as she lifts up her small bundle and runs on ahead to the large room upstairs. Lisa and Hiyori, growing bored of the men's debate, follow her soon after.

The loft room is quite spacious, and it's not very drafty, either. The only windows are high up off the floor, letting in little sunlight and cold air from the outdoors. Mashiro lets out a whoop of delight and claims a corner of the room, already babbling at the speed of light.

"I'm gonna get a dresser, and a lamp, and a piano, and a chair, and a couch, and a..." She rambles on and on while Lisa watches in amusement, dragging her trunk over to a separate spot on the floor.

"I didn't even know she could play the piano," she says mostly to herself, pulling out a well-worn sleeping bag from her belongings. Hiyori just walks over to the wall, sets herself down, and stays silent. Lisa notices this strange behavior from the normally loud and abrasive girl, but doesn't say anything.

It's not like they aren't all different people than they were back then. Kensei's hair trigger is thinner. Rose has become more observant of details. Love is more laid back, acting like everybody's older brother. Hachi's becoming more or less an amateur therapist. And Shinji... well, the less said about how much Shinji has changed, the better.

Even happy-go-lucky Mashiro is a different person from before. Lisa may not have been too close to the girl back in the Soul Society, but even she knows that Mashiro didn't have nightmares like this before.

She can't say anything that will make their situation easier. So she just stays silent. And Hiyori does the same.

The cold night descends far too quickly on the ragtag group of refugees, who end up making the last of the bedroom arrangements in a half-asleep state. Still, Shinji lies awake in his new room, staring up at the ceiling as if writing will appear on it telling him the truth of the universe. Kensei grumbles something about Mashiro and turnips before rolling back over onto his other side, completely dead to the world. Finally, Shinji gets tired of tossing and turning and slips out of the makeshift bed, making sure to leave the room quietly so not to disturb his sleeping roommate.

Walking quietly down the hall running outside their bedroom, he takes a quick peek through the cracked door to Hachi, Love, and Rose's room. All three were sleeping peacefully, so he doesn't linger. He walks out into the large living area, where to his surprise, he sees Hiyori, sitting beside a makeshift bonfire. Allowing a little smirk to play across his lips, he sneaks up behind her, not making a sound.

"It's not that cold, you know." He probably deserves the shriek and the pummeling that comes next.

"Gah! Hold it right there! You think you can rob me you got another thing- oh, it's you. Dickhead," she ends lamely, upon noticing who exactly it is that she's pummeling within an inch of his existence. He scowls at her, rubbing the new bruises on his face.

"Geez. I just wanted to surprise you, and the first thing that comes to your mind is a mugging?" Hiyori looks away from him and back to the fire, which he just now notices is actually a kido.

""Humph. Hey, I grew up in the Rukongai, remember? I didn't have an easy life like you nobles." Shinji settles down beside her, sitting down cross-legged.

"Please. If you think nobility is easy, you've got another thing coming. And the Hirako family is one of the lesser families – we've got nothing on, say, the Shibas or the Kuchikis." He takes a brief moment to recall the Captain of the Sixth and his impetuous heir, and the young man that Ukitake had been hounding to become his lieutenant. He wonders for a moment if he ever succeeded. Hiyori responds with a snort.

"Heh. Whatever. Doesn't matter. Noble is noble, even if you're just a Fon or a Kira." Shinji gives her a look, but says nothing, instead bringing up his arms to warm up his fingers. The silence fills the dark night, broken only by the crackling kido flames, which Hiyori occasionally pokes at.

"So..." he says at last, looking down at the unusually quiet girl. "What do you think?" The girl doesn't look up at him, just pushes the flames around, causing them to flare up in a warm wave.

"About what?" Shinji gestures around the large warehouse vaguely.

"This place. You haven't given a straight answer all day." Hiyori scowls, moving up closer to the fire. Shinji moves too, so that he's now sitting right behind her.

"Meh. It's okay." Shinji looks down at her, a bit annoyed but too tired to do his usual frown.

"See, there you go again. Why don't you just tell me these things?" Hiyori just lets out a small humph, and crosses her arms defiantly. After about fifteen minutes, she answers again.

"I... I don't hate it." They aren't very loud, these five words she says, but Shinji hears them loud and clear. He looks up to the ceiling, strong and sturdy despite the years, and allows a smile to slip across his face.

"Welcome home, then. Home sweet home."


End file.
